MEMBERS of the United States Congress have been treated for exhaustion after giving Prime Minister Julia Gizzard six standing ovations and 10 rounds of applause during a speech to the US assembly.

Ms Gizzard was asked to address the congress after a last-minute cancellation by Weird Al Yankovic.

She used the forum to thank America for landing on the moon, the Brady Bunch and hamburgers. There were mixed reviews on her performance.

“I didn't find it very funny,” one congressman admitted. “I had really been looking forward to hearing Eat It and White & Nerdy.”

Another congressman from the south said he thought the whole thing was a special promotion for the movie Rango.

“Rango is a chameleon whose only friends are toys and a dead cricket,” he explained. “These are not particularly good friends, particularly the cricket.

“After meeting an armadillo seeking the mystical Spirit of the West he has a surreal nightmare after which he meets a lizard called Beans who takes him to a town called Dirt populated by animals and Bill Nighy.”

The congressman said he realised after a while that the Prime Minister's speech had nothing to do with Rango.

“Apparently she was promoting something called Ranger, about a redhead who joins Clint Eastwood to fight a bare-knuckle bout with former Prime Minister Kevin Rut over Libya and white meat,” he said.

Ms Gizzard told Congress she would welcome an expanded American presence in Australia.

“We have McDonald's, Kentucky Fried Chicken and Kristina Keneally so you could slip in a few more and we'd hardly notice,” she said.

A Congress spokesman said Australians should not read much into the standing ovations.

“We pretty much give standing ovations to anyone,” he said. “We are up and down all day like Irish squat dancers. But we don't take a lot of notice of what they are saying. She had us at ‘moving forward'.”